Trump’s Officials Debated Tariffs On Sunday Shows

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth on Sunday Morning Futures: “What President Trump said in his State of the Union address is that China has too much influence over the Panama Canal and America’s going to take it back. Chinese influence cannot control our own backyard.”

Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick President Donald J. Trump

FinTech BizNews Service

Mumbai, April 13, 2025: This morning, the Trump Administration’s top officials took to the Sunday shows to discuss the state of President Donald J. Trump’s reciprocal tariffs, how negotiations are progressing, and the results they’ve already delivered on behalf of American workers and businesses, as per the details on the website of the White House.

Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick on This Week

• On tariffs for certain electronics: “Those products are going to be part of the semiconductor sectoral tariffs, which are coming … We need to have these things made in America.”
• On the constitutionality of tariffs: “Congress has passed laws that gave the president the ability to protect our national security … If we just run gigantic trade deficits and sell our soul to the rest of the world, eventually we are going to be the worker for the rest of the world.”
• On expanding market access: “Our farmers are finally going to have access to the world’s markets. Our farmers have never had the opportunity to sell corn in India — so what’s going to happen is as they sell more and more products, prices will come down.”
• 
  

Senior Counselor for Trade and Manufacturing Peter Navarro on Meet the Press

• On tariffs negotiations: “This is unfolding exactly like we thought it would … We have a strategy here where the President says we’re going to charge them what they charge us … knowing full well that a lot of countries would come right to us and want to bargain.”
• On semiconductor tariffs: “The policy is no exemptions, no exclusions … What the Secretary of Commerce, Howard Lutnick, is going to do — and he’s doing it as we speak — is an investigation of the chips supply chain. The goal is stability and resilience.”
• On inflation: “We had really good news on the inflation front — both the Producer Price Index, which is your wholesale prices, and Consumer Price Index had the lowest print since fall of 2023.”

National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett on State of the Union

• On China: “In the 15 years after China entered the WTO, real wages went down — so wages went down by more than prices as we thought these cheap goods were going to revolutionize America. In fact, it was the opposite.”

U.S. Trade Representative Ambassador Jamieson Greer on Face the Nation

• On trade deal negotiations: “My goal is to get meaningful deals before 90 days — and I think we’re going to be there with several countries in the next few weeks.”
• On the response to reciprocal tariffs: “President Trump has a global program to try to reshore American manufacturing and address the trade deficit. It’s a global issue. The only reason we’re really in this position right now is because China chose to retaliate.”
• On tariffs exemptions: “For the national security tariffs, you have to do an investigation in order to impose the tariffs … That’s why they don’t have a tariff covered right now because you have to go through the investigation … We expect there will have to be some kind of tariff.”

Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins on Fox News Sunday

• On trade: “For decades, the way we have been treated in this country and especially our farmers and ranchers is absolutely stunning. We have been living under a tariff regime but it has been the regime of other countries … The President is working to fix it.”
• On ethanol production: “Ethanol is a very important part of our energy independence strategy. President Trump has been unequivocal in his support for ethanol.”

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth on Sunday Morning Futures

• On the Panama Canal: “What President Trump said in his State of the Union address is that China has too much influence over the Panama Canal and America’s going to take it back — and that’s exactly what I was charged to do … Chinese influence cannot control our own backyard.”
• On Iran: “[President Trump is] dead serious that Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon … He’s also dead serious that if we can’t figure this out at the negotiating table, then there are other options.”

White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller on Sunday Morning Futures

• On tariffs: “When the President issued his reciprocal tariffs, our government at the time specifically said that chips and semiconductors, which are critical components of our national security, were going to be dealt with through a separate Commerce authority known as a 232. That was always the plan because those components are so essential to our national security. We need to have a separate process for dealing with how to reshore those essential industries … There are no exemptions.”
• On President Trump’s historic actions: “History will record that the actions President Trump has taken in recent days were the beginning of saving the West from complete economic domination by another power.”